Two Eastern Cape female boxers, Bukiwe Nonina and Namhla Mankayi, travel to Bloemfontein on Thursday in a quest to revive their careers while also keeping their fingers crossed for their Saturday bouts to come to fruition.
Mdantsane’s Mankayi will vie to snap her three-fight losing streak when she takes on Emma Mahono in a mini-flyweight non-title clash.
Dutywa’s veteran, Nonina, also returns to the ring against Matshidiso Mokatsana for the Free State junior-lightweight title.
The fights will form part of the Women in Boxing Series hosted by the Free State province after it kicked off in Limpopo at the beginning of August.
While Nonina hails from Dutywa but is based in Gauteng, she will contest for the Free State belt as Boxing SA relaxed the rules limiting boxers to only fight for titles of their provinces.
Nonina, a former WBF champion, will be looking to rebound from two successive losses when she dropped a points decision to Bernice Ferreira in March 2025 before again falling short in Russia.
Here she was stopped in eight rounds by one-fight novice Natalia Shadrina in November.
Her loss to Ferreira has since become more respectable after Ferreira went on to make history as the first SA female boxer to hold two world titles when she beat Frenchwoman Caroline Veyre for WBC and IBO junior-lightweight belts in the US a few weeks ago.
Mankayi, 30, will be looking to advance her aspirations to challenge for the SA title by beating Mahono in a battle of boxers coming from losses.
Training at the More Blows Boxing Club at NU1 in Mdantsane, the boxer who goes by the “Gupta” moniker is rated sixth in SA rankings.
Trained by Akhona Mtyongwe with Khanyisile Bomoyi handling management duties, Mankayi is unfazed by fighting outside KuGompo City for the first time in her seven-fight career.
“We want to make the best of this opportunity as our objective is to challenge for the SA title,” Bomoyi said.
With provincial boxers having been rocked by fight cancellations at the 11th hour recently, Mankayi’s camp breathed a sigh of relief when travel tickets were sent by Queen Empire Boxing Promotions, which will stage the fight.
Two provincial female boxers, Owethu Rula and Azasakhe Jamani, had their bouts in Cape Town cancelled at the 11th hour a fortnight ago when the promoters reportedly failed to avail funds on time.
As if that was not enough, Mthatha’s SA welterweight champion Phaphama Rhonorhono also had his title defence called off when his opponent, Jabulani Makhense, could not make weight in Middelburg, Mpumalanga, last weekend.
“At least we are relieved that the fight will go ahead as planned, as organisers have constantly been in contact with us,” Bomoyi said.
Mankayi, whose record sports four losses with just three wins, will come up against an opponent who has lost five, winning just two.
